


What the Pea Proved

by akamarykate



Category: Fairy Tales & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-24
Updated: 2007-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-25 03:43:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,892
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1629716
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akamarykate/pseuds/akamarykate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two tales, knit together; why did the princess come to the castle in the first place?</p>
            </blockquote>





	What the Pea Proved

**Author's Note:**

> Deepest thanks to inkling for the record-setting beta!
> 
> Written for Sister Coyote

 

 

The storm had been raging for days that felt like years, and Sari had been walking for most of them. The wind stung her cheeks with thousands of tiny needles; the rain soaked through her cloak and into her very bones. Rocks left layers of bruises on the soles of her thick-booted feet as she struggled up the mountain. If not this pain, though, it would be another. She pressed on until she came to the castle.

It was the small castle of a small kingdom, but what it lacked in size it made up for in height, sending spiraling turrets into the dark sky until they were lost in clouds and thunder. To Sari, who had never seen a castle, it was grand and terrifying and impossible to imagine as anyone's home, let alone hers. 

By the time she reached the door, she was more storm than Sari. It tangled itself in her hair and wedged under her skin, and the pace of thunder and lightning matched her heartbeat. She waited for the thunder to roll away before she pulled the bell string twice. 

The door flew open almost immediately. A young man a full head taller than Sari asked, "Are you the princess?"

A gust of wind cut through to Sari's heart. Shivering so hard she couldn't speak, she nodded. 

"Good," he said. "I'm Prince Rupert. You may come in now." He stepped aside. She stumbled past the prince, gasping at the rush of light and warmth that overwhelmed her senses. Before she knew it, he had her by the elbow and was steering her into a room bigger than her entire home and calling for his mother.

After the dark ravages of the storm, she simply could not follow what happened next. Voices, questions, cloud-soft blankets, a warm drink, the blazing fire, the hunched figure knitting in on the hearth, the dark-haired queen and the redheaded prince--they all blurred together in her relief, and she mistook desperation for hospitality.

"Yes," she said in response to all their questions, though she only heard half of them. "Yes, I am; yes, I will; yes, please, I would very much like to sleep."

They led Sari to a room, smaller, cozier, but just as tall as the first. It had to be, to hold the pile of feather mattresses they called a bed. It was an utter waste of good ticking, but perhaps all royals slept on mountains of down. She climbed the ladder and curled into a nest of blankets at the top, closing her eyes and ears to the queen and her servants far below.

~*~*~

Her dreams were strange and horrible: prisons of gold, wells full of screams, bindweed climbing the sides of the bed to hold her while vultures pecked her backside. She woke in a grey light that might have been dawn. It was hard to tell with the storm still lashing rain against the room's single narrow window. Sweat-dampened and sore, Sari knew she could not endure another moment on the royal bed. She pulled a single blanket free, crawled down the ladder, and settled on the stone floor, where she slept peacefully for a short time. 

The servant girl who woke her "tsk"ed and fussed at finding the Princess on the floor. When she saw the bruises on Sari's legs and back, she applied a salve that smelled like goat dung and took the edge off the pain. She gave Sari a green woolen dress to wear, two sizes too big and worth more than all the clothes Sari had ever owned put together. 

_So this is what it is to be a princess_ , Sari thought as the girl--"Hilla," she said in response to Sari's question, eyes wide with wonder at being asked--tucked and tied the dress, braided Sari's hair into a thick dark plait, and tied a pair of silver slippers on her feet. 

"How did they know?" she asked as Hilla led her to the breakfast room--one whole room, just for breakfast! "I sent no word that I was coming. I was afraid they wouldn't want me."

"Of course they do," Hilla said. "They've been looking for such a long time. We're all very glad that a true princess has been found at last." She snapped her mouth shut and opened the door for Sari. 

The royal family sat at a table laid with enough breads, fruits, and meats to feed an entire village. Heedless of the storm howling just outside, Prince Rupert downed sausages and apples as if they might be taken from him at any moment. The king and queen had clasped hands, right there on the table, their plates empty. They watched Sari hungrily, as if she were the meal. 

Wary of their attention, she slipped into the chair Hilla pulled out for her. Another servant brought a goblet filled with juice, which Sari sipped while Hilla whispered in the queen's ear. The queen's concentration on Sari never faltered, but the lines around her eyes eased and a smile bloomed on her lips. Hilla left, and Sari was left to act the part of a princess alone.

Under the noises of the storm, there was another sound, a sharp, rhythmic click. In the corner farthest from the table, the bent old woman Sari remembered from the night before sat knitting, ivory needles blurring in the dim light. She never looked up, but a crooked smile twisted her mouth in the next lightning flash.

Knitting was the one familiar thing in all this finery. Her own mother had--Sari swallowed against grief that was still fresh and sharp. Dwelling on it would make her task impossible. She lifted her chin and faced the royal family.

"This is King Frederick," the queen said, with a nod to her broad, pepper-haired husband. "You met Prince Rupert last night, and I am Queen Maud."

"Good morning," Sari said. 

Rupert looked up, a half-eaten sausage on his fork, and grinned at her. "Good morning to you!" His voice was deep, showing his age as much as the feathery beginnings of an auburn beard on his chin, but his smile was that of a small boy. "What's your name?"

"Sari," she told him, bemused. She was sure she'd offered that much to them the night before, and dimly remembered him commenting upon it. 

"Like a dolly bird," he chortled now. "Saree! Saree! Saree!"

"Rupert," the queen said, finally tearing her gaze away from Sari. "That's quite enough. Have more spiced apples. Sari, please help yourself. You'll need a good breakfast to get through the day's events."

Sari took a slice of fruitbread and an orange and put them on her plate. She'd only sunk her thumbnail into the orange peel, spraying juice on her hand, when the queen asked, far too casually, "How did you sleep?"

"To be honest," said Sari, who was not used to being anything else, "not very well." She shifted in her chair as her bruises throbbed. "You were kind to put me in such an extravagant bed, but it felt as though there was a boulder under all those mattresses." 

The king frowned, and Sari feared she'd insulted their hospitality. "Perhaps," she added quickly, "it was the storm. It gave me nightmares, and I'd had a long journey here. The bruises could have been there already. I've always been prone to small injuries."

The queen clapped her hands and leapt to her feet. "No, no, we checked last night when we dressed you for sleep, and there were no bruises on your back." She turned, beaming, to her husband. "The servant girl confirms her story! Sari has bruises all over her back and her legs. It's her, Frederick! She's the one!"

Sari dropped the orange. It rolled to the old woman's corner. It was relief that shocked Sari; she'd never dreamed this would be this simple or this soon, and she wasn't used to keeping secrets. Goats had so few. "Then you know?" she whispered. "You know that I'm truly the princess?"

"But of course we do!" The queen tugged at Sari's hand she stood, then kissed her cheeks, time and again. "We're so glad to have finally found you, my dear."

Sari disentangled herself from the queen. "What about Rupert?"

"Of course I'm glad, too," said the prince. "You don't know what it's been like, questioning dozens of princesses who chattered like magpies, and none of them were--what's the word, Mother?"

"Sensitive," said the queen, smiling brighter than the lightning.

"None of them were sensitive enough to be my wife."

"Your--" Sari choked, though she hadn't eaten a bite. She sat down hard on the chair.

"But she'll be just right, Mother!" Rupert crowed. "She looks so much like you."

Sari's ears pounded, as if thunder had lodged in her skull.

"Now we can be married and get on with running the kingdom. Isn't that right, Father?"

King Frederick raised his goblet. "If your mother says she's the one, then by all means, let us proceed. To Sari."

"To Sari!" Rupert grinned at her as he downed his juice. 

Queen Maud's hands pinned Sari to her chair, but had she been free, she still could not have moved. She certainly could not speak.

"I must make arrangements. Do you think we have enough musicians to outplay this storm? Will people come through the rain?" Rupert stood, bouncing on his toes, turning his hopeful glance at each of them in turn.

"Go see the steward," said the queen. "He'll take care of everything."

"But--" Sari began. The queen dug long fingers into her shoulders, silencing her and leaving new bruises. 

"Oh!" Rupert stopped at the door. "I should kiss you, shouldn't I? The stories always end with a kiss." Before Sari could even take a breath, he swooped down on her, pressing dry lips against hers. "That's better." He swept his directionless smile around the room and left. 

Sari pressed her fingers to her burning lips. The only sounds were the muffled roll of thunder and the clack of the old woman's knitting needles. 

Queen Maud inhaled sharply, then released Sari along with her breath. Sari sprang to her feet.

"You have this all wrong," she said, stumbling into the table in her rush to escape the queen's hands. She felt a new bruise spread along her thigh. "You're mistaken, all of you. I did not come here to marry Prince Rupert!"

"Sari," the queen said, moving to stand near her husband. "Princess Sari. It's lovely."

"Are you _quite_ mad?" Sari squeaked. "Did you hear me? I will not marry the prince. I want that clear right now."

The queen's tears were in her voice as well as her eyes. "Oh, but my dear--"

"Enough!" The king's command rang through the room, over the rain and thunder. "Both of you. Sit down now. There are things," he said to Sari, his tone softening, "that you do not understand."

A snort came from the corner of the room.

"Is there something you wish to say?" the king asked the old woman.

"Princess Sari is not the only one lacking understanding." The woman's voice was a creaking of dry wood, a crackle of a small fire. 

"This is all your doing," the king said, "and now you will be silent while it unfolds."

Sari looked to the old woman, whose shoulders lifted in a shrug. She never once looked up from her knitting.

"Sit down, Sari, please," the queen begged as she slipped into her own chair. "We won't ask you to do anything but listen."

"For now," the old woman said with a chortle. King Frederick scowled. Her needles clicked even faster.

Sari sat, cautious of the table's edge. "I cannot marry Rupert." She would keep saying it until they heard.

"We know Rupert is a little odd," said Queen Maud. "He always has been. As a child, he was a delight, but as a prince, and a future king, he--"

"He doesn't have the wits for the job," King Frederick finished. The queen bit her lip, but didn't contradict him. "Therefore, we knew he would need an exceptional wife, someone who possessed the qualities of a true princess, someone who can help him rule wisely when the time comes. The pea under your mattress was a test."

"You put a pea under my mattress to test me? Do you mean to say that the best princess is one who bruises easily?" Sari asked, befuddled.

"It's a sign, dear. A sign of true sensitivity. A real princess must have that sensitivity, that depth of feeling for her husband--and her people, of course. At least," Queen Maud added with a glance at the old woman, "that's what she told us. She promised that if we found a young woman who could pass that test, we would find the true princess--and future queen--of our land."

"But--" Sari faltered, rubbing her bruised thigh, "but--"

"It's simple," King Frederick said curtly. "You will marry Rupert, help him to fulfill his duties, and receive all the wealth and privilege you could possibly desire. It's a fine bargain."

Sari took a deep breath, one, for a moment, with the wind gusting against the castle walls. "Let me be sure I understand. You believe that I traveled through this storm and showed up on your doorstep to marry a prince you admit is not quite all there? That because I could feel a pea under a dozen mattresses, I will be fit to rule your kingdom? Is that _truly_ what you believe?"

The queen nodded earnestly. The king sighed and cut into a sausage. "Maud, can't you make her see reason?"

"I certainly _don't_ see reason in this," Sari said before the queen could placate her. "You want me to help run your kingdom, though you know nothing about me. When you said I was the princess you were searching for, I thought you meant me, myself, not Rupert's future wife."

It was Queen Maud's turn to look confused. Even the king raised an eyebrow. "Why would we search for you?" he asked.

"Since I showed up last night, no one has once asked me where I came from. I told you I was a princess, and you never asked what or where I am princess of. You haven't asked who my parents are--" She pressed her palm to the shard of grief in her throat, then went on. "--or why I traveled through the storm to see you. You certainly haven't asked whether I _want_ to marry your son. Aren't you the least bit curious about me?"

King Frederick waved a hand. The jewel on his ring flashed red in the lightning. "None of it matters. You passed the test. You are fit to be queen one day, with Rupert as your king."

"Rupert shouldn't be king, no matter who he marries," Sari said. "Rupert is not your child."

Every time she had pictured this moment, all through her stormy journey, Sari had come up blank, unable to see past the grief that drove her. She was unprepared, and all the tiny things that made up the moment stung her like wasps--the queen's gasp, the needle clicks scraping the air before the shattering crack of thunder, and the king's terrible frown as he rose to his feet.

"There are only two people outside this room who know that," he said, his words grinding against Sari's cheeks.

"No," Sari whispered, thinking of the graves she'd left in a tiny churchyard. "None are left, outside this room."

The king smiled, ugly and slow.

"Sari?" the queen asked faintly.

"The two who knew, I called Mother and Father. On her deathbed, before the plague that swept our village took her, my mother told me the truth of who I am. She bade me find you so that I wouldn't be alone." Again, grief tore into her throat. The king and queen waited while she struggled with it. 

"Rupert is her son," she went on, "not yours. As much as she loved me--and she did love me--she wished every day that she could know and love her son, too. But she said nothing, nothing at all, about wanting me to marry him."

King Frederick's jaw clenched, the same way her father's used to when the goats escaped. 

"Does he know that he is not your son?"

"He is not our natural child, but he is still by rights ours," the king said. "Nothing else matters."

The queen, however, turned to the old woman in the corner. "Oh," she said, "Oh. Now I see. You didn't mean to help us find _a_ princess to marry Rupert. You meant to help us find _the_ princess. Her sensitivity, it's because--" Gasping again, she reached for Sari. "Oh, my darling, you are our daughter!"

"Well, that too," the king grumbled, as the queen hugged Sari tight.

This was the moment Sari had hardly dared hope for, all through her stormy journey. But now she pushed herself free to stand alone, facing the king and queen. Her hands, aching with every flash of lightning, curled into fists.

"I don't see how you can call me your own. You gave me away. You," she said to the queen, "bore a daughter, and you," she said to the king, "wanted a son. So you found a peasant woman who had just given birth and traded your daughter for the woman's new son. That woman is the one I called, and will always call, Mother. My parents raised me with love, in a far-off corner of the kingdom where you could not reach them. They raised me as a goatherd, and protected me as best they could from the hurts of the world, as you did not."

"We had a good reason, I promise." The queen brought her folded hands to her mouth. "We wanted to protect you, too."

Sari sucked in a breath that burned her throat like lightning. "From what, exactly, were you trying to protect me? From a life of luxury? From dresses trimmed with silk, and oranges in the wintertime?" Sari pointed to the books strewn casually on a side table. "From an _education_?"

"From her," the king boomed. He turned his scowl on the woman in the corner. "From the witch who plagues our lives."

The woman's needles slowed. She lifter her head, her gaze fixed on Sari. 

"He's right, Sari, darling," said the queen. "All this is her fault. But now you're here, you're back, and we can make it right."

"Make it right," Sari echoed, but she was drawn to the old woman, as if she were yarn being pulled ever closer to the needles. She moved to the dim corner and saw what the woman was knitting--a shawl, a shroud, something large and rectangular. It contained all the colors of the storm: slate, indigo, charcoal, violet, flashes of silver light. All the colors of the storm, all the colors of a bruise, knotted together on needles of bone. 

Sari met the old woman's blue gaze. "Is it truly your fault?"

The woman's voice cracked like a lightning-split sky. "The story always changes."

"We wanted a child so badly," the queen said with a sniffle. Sari glanced back at her; she stood, one hand reaching out for Sari, but she did not come closer. "We tried everything. She said she could help."

"Red clover. Angelica. Hops flower. Wild yam." The witch recited the herbs in time with the clicking of her needles. A hint of green crept into her yarn. "And other plants that only grow in my garden. Simple plants. Tricky mixture. Might have a baby. Might meet your death." The bone needles picked up speed, and a lightning flash illuminated the queen's pale, lined face.

"I was willing to risk anything for a child. For you."

Sari folded her arms. "But."

"Sari--"

"You gave me up, so there must have been a _but_."

"Cravings," the old woman snapped. She flashed a glance of pure malevolence at the king. "Thievery."

King Frederick hid whatever reaction he might have had by sipping from his goblet. "She wanted rampion," he muttered, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Day and night. Thought she'd die without it. Or lose the child."

 _The child_ , Sari thought with a shiver. _Me._

"Frederick loved me so much, he risked the witch's wrath to get some from her garden. It wouldn't grow anywhere else in the kingdom that year."

"She cursed the ground," said the king. 

Instead of arguing with him, the witch looked at Sari, one eyebrow and the corner of her mouth raised. "Caught him," she said. "For theft, a price must be paid."

"He was imprisoned by magic," said the queen, her eyes round with fear as if it had happened days ago.

"Damn vines," the king growled. 

Queen Maud dared a step closer to the corner, to Sari. "In return for his freedom and the rampion, she extracted a terrible promise. She told him we would have a daughter, and that she would come for it and take it with her once it was born."

 _It._ The word stung Sari like a thorn. _Me._

"Of course we couldn't let her have you. So we fooled her. There was a woman down in the village whose belly was as round as mine. We brought her to the castle, and when the children were born--my daughter, her son--we switched them. I held you for the briefest moment, my darling, but I've always loved you, always."

"You gave me away. What kind of love is that?"

"The kind of love," said the king, "that meant we didn't have to give you into that woman's evil hands. Without a daughter, the contract was null and void."

The witch "har-urmph"ed at that, yanking on her skein of yarn. A particularly loud clap of thunder made the goblets jump. "You gained a son," she snapped at the king as Sari's ears rang. "Which is what you wanted in the first place."

A son with hair the color of autumn leaves and freckles around his eyes, like those of the woman she had always called--would always call--Mother. "You gave me away," Sari repeated. "You searched in every corner of the world for a princess for Rupert, but you never once came looking for me. You never once helped my parents."

The king snorted. "Where do you think they got the goats?"

Hysterical laughter burbled out of Sari's throat, filling the room. "You--you paid for a prince in goats!" she gasped. "And after all that, he isn't fit to rule your kingdom."

"Sari." The queen glided closer and put a hand on Sari's arm. Sari's last giggle faded into the pattering rain. "We are so glad you found us. Everything has worked out perfectly. You can marry Rupert, and no one will have to know." She caressed Sari's hair as if Sari were still a babe. "Everyone will know you as a princess, the princess you were always meant to be. You will be cherished and adored. You'll never, ever go hungry again. You will have soft mattresses and silk clothes--nothing will ever scratch or bruise you. You'll be with us, your real parents."

"Real parents," Sari said, thinking of her mother's cabbage stew and her father's broad hands lifting her high in the air, "don't give up their child when _it_ turns out to be the wrong sort--a girl instead of a boy, a half-wit instead of a properly qualified prince. You're not offering those things because you love me. You're buying my silence."

The queen stepped away, biting her lip.

"It's a price we don't mind paying," said the king. "You can have whatever you like. The education you crave, for example. With the right tutors, you could learn to make the decisions that Rupert can't. Once we're gone, you'll have power along with luxury, until your own son is ready to take the throne."

Her son. Her children. That would mean that she and Rupert, whose casual kiss burned like fire, would have to--Sari swallowed another shrill giggle. It was impossible. If they only knew about Henel, the goatherd who'd kissed her on a summer night when the stars came down and turned into fireflies, they would never speak to her of having Rupert's children.

"What if my silence is not for sale?" she asked. "If your people knew what you've done, I could have your crown. I could have your throne, which is mine by right, without marrying Rupert at all." 

The king took a step toward Sari. He towered over her, blotting out the firelight. The witch's needles snapped against each other like drumbeats. "If you will not sell your silence," he said, "then I will secure it. There is a dungeon beneath this castle that would make the hovel you grew up in seem like heaven itself to one as _sensitive_ \--" He spat the word like a curse. "--as you."

"Frederick, no!" squealed the queen. "You wouldn't. She's our daughter."

"We have a son. We need no daughter other than the one he marries." The king reached for Sari's shoulder, squeezing it where the queen had earlier. Behind Sari, the witch stood, dropping her knitting. King Frederick glanced at her, took a deep breath, and then looked at Sari with kinder eyes.

"You came here to claim your rightful place. We have emptied treasure chests worth of gold trying to find the right princess. Your marriage to Rupert is a simple enough way for all of us to get what we want."

Sari opened her mouth, then closed it. She did not trust the king and his bargains, but she had no doubt at all about his threats. Summoning the determination that had seen her up the mountain and through the storm, she said, "I didn't come here to become a princess. I already am, I always have been. No one, not even you, can change that." 

Mouth gaping, the king didn't try to hold Sari when she stepped away from his hand.

"Having lost one true family, I came here to find another." She looked at the scowling king and the weeping queen. "Now I'm not sure I want it."

"Rank is your birthright," said the witch from just behind Sari. "Family, you can make."

"You could tell the kingdom who I truly am," Sari told the king. "None of us would have to live a lie."

The king shook his head. "They cannot know what I have done."

"Pride. Worthless." The witch's words tickled Sari's ears and raised goosebumps on her arms. Sari turned to her, and a light caught her eye--not lightning, but a faint slant of sun, breaking through the clouds and landing on the witch's abandoned knitting. The storm had ended at last. Dark and gnarled as a lightning-scoured tree, the witch should have terrified Sari. Instead, Sari felt her grief lift for the first time in weeks. The pieces of the story fell together, like stones in a mosaic. 

"I was conceived with your magic," Sari said. "Before I was born, I was bargained away to you so I could be nourished by your garden. That's what's made me so sensitive. It was I who woke the cravings in the queen. I've always loved rampion. My mother cooked it with butter and salt." Her mouth watered at the memory. "The king violated his promise to you because he didn't want a daughter. By rights I am yours."

"No," said the queen. "No, Sari, please. . ."

"No," said the king. "I will not allow it."

"No," said the witch. Her blue eyes flashed, sunlight on the sea, and promised rampion and knitted silk, and more power than the king could ever dream. "The bargains made and broken were not yours. You belong to no one but yourself."

For a moment, wonder and faith in the witch's truth left Sari breathless. When she could move again, she picked up the fallen knitting. The empty bone needles dropped to her feet as she held up the length of dark colors, soft and fine as a cobweb. She turned back to the witch.

"Will you teach me?"

"You were born of magic," said the witch. "You can learn anything you wish."

"She'll imprison you in a tower," Queen Maud sobbed.

The witch laughed. "No tower is taller than this castle."

 _Or more of a prison_ , thought Sari. She felt a stab of sympathy for Rupert, but it fled when she wrapped the witch's knitting around her shoulders. The throb of all her bruises faded to nothing. Sunlight streamed through the window, warming her face. She took the witch's knobby hand and heard a name that hadn't been spoken for centuries clang through her head like a watchman's bell.

"Alarice," she said. "I choose you for my family." 

Alarice nodded, picked up her needles, stuck them in the wayward orange, and handed them to the king. Frederick and Maud watched, silent, as the princess and the witch walked out of the room, out of the castle, and into a story all their own.

 


End file.
